Upon Amazon’s Current: Disease, Drug Cartels and the Challenges of Exploration with Adventurer Marcin Gienieczko
Upon Amazon’s Current: Disease, Drug Cartels and the Challenges of Exploration with Adventurer Marcin Gienieczko
Marcin Gienieczko, a Polish explorer that made a Jungle Survival Training Course with Amazon Explorer in Iquitos, Peru, before the crossing along the Amazon River.
By: Adam Zmarzlinski (Poland)
Guinness Record, Marcin from PolandThere is a saying in Brazil that goes, “At the blacksmith’s house, only wooden skewers” (Em casa de ferreiro, espeto de pau). Its meaning is a bit on the nose: focus too much on one thing and everything else is bound to fall apart, bound to be of a lesser quality than everything else in one’s life. Marcin Gienieczko, a Polish sportsman, adventurer, explorer and the first person to cross the Amazon River via canoe, is a living antithesis to that statement.
While on his 6,800-kilometer (4,225 mile) journey down the Amazon River, he maintained constant contact with family, focused on overcoming the struggles associated with the force of nature that is the largest river in the world, and above all else, kept—as well as he could—sane while encountering disease, fickle weather and gun barrels pointed at his face. I sat down with Marcin to understand what it takes to challenge a force of nature and win.
The idea for his 2015 adventure, which took him from San Antonio District, Peru to the Bay of Baia de Marajo off the Brazilian coast, came to him while on an expedition through the Yukon River in Alaska and Northwestern Canada. “No one’s taken on the Amazon via canoe before,” he explained. “It appealed to me. In my youth, I hoped to undertake the challenge of the Congo River in Africa. Unfortunately, war broke out in that inflamed part of the world between the Tutsi and Hutu tribes.” Traveling the depths of the Congo, and the borders of Rwanda and Burundi, was too dangerous. “So I settled on the Amazon,” he exclaimed with a smile.
Beside the Yukon, Marcin had a lifetime-worth of adventures under his belt: canoeing the rivers Mackenzie, Lena, Vistula and the Baltic Sea from Bornholm, Denmark to Darlowo, Poland. He rode the northern regions of Mongolia on horseback during an expedition to reach the Tsataan tribe, one of the last remaining native tribes of Mongolia. Traveling through Tibet on foot and ski along the Kolyma River, he felt the cold of negative 53 °C (-63 °F) nip at his face. Traveling with the Polish Press Corp through China, he aided with research on the Shaolin monastery. During his stay, he learned kung-fu and studied Zen philosophy. He acted as camp photographer for US-Canadian expedition that ventured along the north-east ridge of Mt. Everest. His life is a kaleidoscope of adventure, but as he says, “None were as challenging as the Amazon. None.”
Marcin Gienieczko, a Polish explorer that made a Jungle Survival Training Course with Amazon Explorer in Iquitos, Peru, before the crossing along the Amazon River.
By: Adam Zmarzlinski (Poland)
Guinness Record, Marcin from PolandThere is a saying in Brazil that goes, “At the blacksmith’s house, only wooden skewers” (Em casa de ferreiro, espeto de pau). Its meaning is a bit on the nose: focus too much on one thing and everything else is bound to fall apart, bound to be of a lesser quality than everything else in one’s life. Marcin Gienieczko, a Polish sportsman, adventurer, explorer and the first person to cross the Amazon River via canoe, is a living antithesis to that statement.
While on his 6,800-kilometer (4,225 mile) journey down the Amazon River, he maintained constant contact with family, focused on overcoming the struggles associated with the force of nature that is the largest river in the world, and above all else, kept—as well as he could—sane while encountering disease, fickle weather and gun barrels pointed at his face. I sat down with Marcin to understand what it takes to challenge a force of nature and win.
The idea for his 2015 adventure, which took him from San Antonio District, Peru to the Bay of Baia de Marajo off the Brazilian coast, came to him while on an expedition through the Yukon River in Alaska and Northwestern Canada. “No one’s taken on the Amazon via canoe before,” he explained. “It appealed to me. In my youth, I hoped to undertake the challenge of the Congo River in Africa. Unfortunately, war broke out in that inflamed part of the world between the Tutsi and Hutu tribes.” Traveling the depths of the Congo, and the borders of Rwanda and Burundi, was too dangerous. “So I settled on the Amazon,” he exclaimed with a smile.
Beside the Yukon, Marcin had a lifetime-worth of adventures under his belt: canoeing the rivers Mackenzie, Lena, Vistula and the Baltic Sea from Bornholm, Denmark to Darlowo, Poland. He rode the northern regions of Mongolia on horseback during an expedition to reach the Tsataan tribe, one of the last remaining native tribes of Mongolia. Traveling through Tibet on foot and ski along the Kolyma River, he felt the cold of negative 53 °C (-63 °F) nip at his face. Traveling with the Polish Press Corp through China, he aided with research on the Shaolin monastery. During his stay, he learned kung-fu and studied Zen philosophy. He acted as camp photographer for US-Canadian expedition that ventured along the north-east ridge of Mt. Everest. His life is a kaleidoscope of adventure, but as he says, “None were as challenging as the Amazon. None.”
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